Rabbi Morris Allen, of Beth Jacob
Congregation in Mendota Heights, MN, has
been promoting kashrut, Jewish dietary laws,
to his congregation for twenty years. He
says that kashrut provides “a way in which
we as Jews understand a daily opportunity to
sanctify our lives, to create a sense of
holiness and a sense of awareness of God in
our lives.” This consciousness means that
Allen takes his food and its production
seriously.

More than a year ago, Allen learned of labor
abuses at an Iowa kosher meat processing
plant that supplied the Twin Cities Jewish
community. He was faced with a
contradiction: The worker may slaughter an
animal according to the laws of kashrut, but
he or she may be underpaid and mistreated.
What if the ritual is observed, but the
ethics are undermined?

First she had to find an organic cattle farm
near home. Then a "shochet," a person
trained in kosher slaughtering, who was
willing to do a freelance job. Then a kosher
butcher to carve the beef into various cuts,
and other families from her synagogue to
share it.

All told, it took Devora Kimelman-Block of
Silver Spring, Md., 10 months to obtain 450
pounds of meat that is local, grass-fed,
organic and strictly kosher. It was a lot of
work...

Social action group offers seal of approval
to hundreds of establishments with kosher
business practices.

Michele Chabin - Israel Correspondent

Jerusalem — When Anat Bibi, co-owner of the
Anna Ticho House restaurant, recently
remodeled her eatery’s spacious, serene
garden, she made sure to include gently
sloping ramps to accommodate strollers and
patrons in wheelchairs.

“People are more aware of the need for
accessibility and ask for it,” Bibi said,
pointing to the garden’s multi-level deck,
reachable by ramps. “Accommodating people’s
needs is good business, but it’s also the
right and ethical thing to do.

”Ethical kashrut, an idea that socially
minded Jews in Israel and the U.S. have been
advocating — with varying degrees of success
— for decades, is finally catching on in
Israel, largely thanks to a program run by
the social-action organization Bema’aglei
Tzedek (Circles of Justice).